Memeorandum

September 23, 2011

The Collectivization Of Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness

Senate candidate and Harvard prof Elizabeth Warren is winning kudos on the left for her passionate defense of collectivization:

For those who can’t watch clips online, Warren, after explaining some of the reasons for the nation’s deep fiscal hole, pointed to a more sensible approach to economic policy in general. “I hear all this, you know, ‘Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever,’” she said. “No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody.

“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear: you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for; you hired workers the rest of us paid to educate; you were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did.

“Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea? God bless. Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.”

We stand on the shoulders of giants - no kidding. Ms. Warren is very convincing that those darn rich people ought to be paying some taxes. But wait! They already are!

As to how her argument explains why a factory owner ought to be paying even more taxes, well, I don't know. And to relate it to a hedge-fund hero who could re-incorporate in an off shore tax haven? Forget it. However, there is an annotated response to her posted at InstaPundit highlighting the abusrdity of some of her claims. For example, if union thugs shut down the factor, Ms. Warren would cheer, not send the police.

But I have a problem with her premise, that all your work are belong to us. "We" educated the workers? Even the home-schooled ones? The private-school and Catholic school grads?

"We" built the roads? A factory can be located anywhere in the world. If the numbers for transportation and access to workers make sense, it will be built in Malaysia. If a property is near a good US transportation hub, it may be more valuable, and the land rent will be higher. If the factory owner chooses to pay that higher rent in the US, well, Ms. Warren should be railing at the land-owner. Who of course is subject to property taxes.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

I suppose We the People could yet choose to fullfill Obama's college fantasies and organize as a Euro-style socialist state. But in a land of freedom and opportunity, one might argue (Ms. Warren would not, apparently) that people's freedom comes from God, not Ms. Warren. They are getting educated for their own benefit, not because the government needs taxpayers. They then go forth into the world with their skills to (brace yourself, Ms. Warren) earn a living. If the factory owner offers an unappealing wage, people won't work there; if the product is undesirable, it won't be purchased. Free exchange by free people. The belief (Hope? Faith-based initiative?) is that this optimizes aggregate social well-being, subject to some sort of safety net for those who can't keep up. Obviously, the level of that safety net is a matter of debate.

Well. The social contract debate gets very normative and prescriptive. Ms. Warren's sense of compassion gives her lots of guidance about how the factory owner should organize his operation and compensate his workers, but she has never actually run a factory. And if the factory owner closes down his operation in the States and re-opens next week in Thailand rather than endure Ms. Warren's wacky sense of fairness and appropriate regulation, well, she will express her suprise and advocate for extended unemployment benefits for the workers she meant to help.

IN WHICH I CHANNEL MS. WARREN ON SPORTS IN ORDER TO DELIVER THE OBLIGATORY SPORTS METAPHOR:

FANTASY WARREN: Is A-Rod worth $30 million a year? He didn't invent baseball. And if we moved the fences back to 800 feet he would never hit a home run. So why is he paid anything at all?

FANTASY ME: Good point! And if we moved the fences to 800 feet and made the players hit golf balls off of tees, the Red Sox could quit paying John Lackey to "pitch". Ok, occasional infielders would be struck dead by golf balls, but maybe that would increase fan interest.

Or, we could imagine that the point of baseball is to create a framework with predictable rules so that players and teams can excel or fail within that framweork.

Last year Ms Warren made $350,000 Harvard salary, plus $182,000 in royalties and consulting fees. There is a beef going on about whether Harvard is allowed to keep paying her - since they aren't supposed to be partisan. I say we should use that money for bridges.

Elizabeth Warren's premise begins and ends with the notion that when you work for somebody they owe you, forever.

Anybody in the real world private sector, in virtually any country, can tell you that when the money and/or goods exchange hands, your're even. No cosmic trail continues on for even a couple of minutes .. it's over.

A simple example where her premises falls apart ... you have a dog, you try to teach the dog to do new tricks. If the dog manages to complete a trick, you don't get the dog the box of treats .. you give it one.

She may be insane, but she is typical of her milieu, and that milieu goes far beyond the halls of Harvard. It is also typical of most Democrats today. What is scary is that a woman of her age, background and position can believe so passionately in such shallow ideas--ideas so easily demonstrated to be stupid, false, ungrounded in reality, and irrational.

This reflexive self-righteousness and "passion" is perhaps as dangerous as the Marxist nonsense she spouts. She really should know better, as should the Harvard Regents. It certainly highlights how worthless Harvard had become. This is the sort of stuff one expects out of high-school seniors or college Freshman--mediocre High School senior or college freshman.

Aside from that openly socialist congres0critter from New England, I do not recall any mainstream party's senate candidate who has been so openly communistic. Clearly we have crested some sort of threshold.

Just disgusting. I will wager that she gets elected too. Much must change to save the nation.

You say that she lives in a non-Marxist society. Are you really sure about that?

.....After all, Citizens United upheld the Constitution's intent that
the Rich should have MORE free speech than the unrich.

As bs goes, that's pretty unmitigated. As Soros, Buffett, the Kochs go to prove, the rich have a diversity of views, and we get the benefit of that. Government regualtion of speech tends to result in reelection of the same group of folks year after year. And, unless you think the Congresses of 1994 and 2006 were exemplars of legislative excellence, you should be glad to see the movement.

She never saw the Soviet Union before it collapsed; or lived in Venezuela or Cuba. Too bad. We could take up a collection to smuggle her in to one of the world's collectivist hellholes provided she didn't get the extra special treatment they dole out to useful idiots from abroad.

The reason we know the views of Soros, Buffett, and the Kochs is that they have the wherewithal to get their views out without the help of the MSM. Citizens United makes it possible for the rest of us to pool together to do the same. Since libs dominate the MSM, they have a problem with this.

If you read between the lines of today's Solyndra "partial hangout" in the NYTimes, you get the definitely feeling that not only doesn't the White House know what it is doing when it comes to the solar energy sector, but the Department of Energy is equally, if not more, confused.
How anybody could entrust large sums of money to any of these folks is beyond reason.

"Harvard And Vanderbilt Reportedly Use Hedge Funds To 'Land Grab' In Africa"

LUN

Instead of grabbing money from people called millionaires by Obama, who earn $250,000 working. Why not grab some from
leftist trusts like Harvard who earn
4 billion dollars a year and add that to the 28 billion they already have available to rip off the Africans and spread their Communist propaganda.

--Instead of grabbing money from people called millionaires by Obama, who earn $250,000 working. Why not grab some from
leftist trusts like Harvard who earn
4 billion dollars a year and add that to the 28 billion they already have available to rip off the Africans and spread their Communist propaganda.--

Excellent idea Pagar. After all most of it is just the crumbs tossed by the wealthy to their alma maters to avoid taxes in the first place.
Yes, a college and foundation trust fund wealth tax sounds like a great idea.

.....After all, Citizens United upheld the Constitution's intent that the Rich should have MORE free speech than the unrich.

The opposite is true. The rich have always had the right to spend as individuals as much as the want to promote their causes. Citizens United allows the non-rich to pool their resources to promote a view they share.

Not really. The records speak only to what was put on paper. The testimony will tell us who said what to whom (particularly in conversations involving DoE people), and why. It might well tell us who said what concerning what should and should not be presented in the written record.

I hope they immunize the CFO. He will have more of the details regarding the proximate cause of the collapse than would the CEO. I'd really like to know which one of the VC angels pulled the plug. I don't think it was Kaiser.